


Running Hot

by fitztomania



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Angst, Canon - Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, M/M, Multi, Spoilers - Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, assassin!Axel, mostly canon, zombie!Roxas
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-11-26
Updated: 2016-03-23
Packaged: 2018-02-27 01:47:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2674334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fitztomania/pseuds/fitztomania
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Axel is good at killing, bad at making friends, and terrified of holding on. </p><p>(/Fairly straightforward 358/2 Days timeline and a lot of character development)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. More or Less

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Axel is, more or less, okay with his job.

Axel is, more or less, okay with his job.

Most days he could do without the killing, but he's good at it, and sometimes the places they send him to are worth it. Like that time they send him to the mountains and he has to kill half a Chinese army and a couple of bears, but it takes way less time than Saïx gives him (because he's good at it), so he gets to spend the next day and a half burrowed deep into the snow with steam rising off of him, feeling slightly less like he wants to crawl out of his skin.

The killing isn't great, but it's what he's good at, and it's what they need. And if he's being honest, it's not horrible. It isn't as if they're ever people he particularly gives a shit about, and one day, somehow, he might get a heart out of it, and then hopefully he won't have to kill anybody anymore, or for that matter answer to anyone else ever again.

But of course there are some days when it's all a bit too much, and on those days he does wish that he could have someone to talk to.

He's tried to have friends. There were a few new recruits after him, and after their training missions, Axel had taken them to that train station in Twilight Town to have an ice cream and shoot the shit. It went, more or less, the same with each of them. A couple of weeks of silence, then the questions (about the Organization, about Kingdom Hearts, about just exactly what the fuck they were supposed to be doing, most of which could be answered with the same blunt statement), and then they got good at their jobs and they forgot how to be friends, and they stopped showing up.

Even Saïx doesn't remember anymore, and treats Axel the same as everyone else-- with calm, cold indifference. Unless he needs a favor.

Nobody else really seems to need friends, or want them. For the most part they all seem pretty content to be grumpy assholes. So Axel stops trying, and Axel is alone, more or less. He travels alone, he eats at the train station alone, he kills people and is good at it, he sleeps around for the closeness but never feels close, and he is always always _always_ too hot.

He asks Marluxia about that, on one particular day off in Marluxia's bed that isn't necessarily nice but seems a lot nicer than most days. Mars is shining brilliantly, his face flushed and his eyes closed and his pretty pink hair spread out across the pillows like some lovely sleeping thing, and Axel, lying on his stomach with his chin on his crossed arms, feels a little nicer, a little closer to him than usual (if not quite there completely), so he asks.

"Mars, do you ever feel. . . I dunno. . . hot?"

Marluxia doesn't open his eyes, but his mouth twists into a small smile and he drawls, "Oh _always_ , Axel."

"I don't mean beautiful, you ass. I mean too hot, like temperature-wise. Like you're running a constant fever or. . .  boiling inside your skin."

"Oh." A beat. "No, I guess I don't. Do you?"

Axel pushes on the marks under his eyes with his forefinger and thumb. "Always."

He is about to tell Mars about his ice cave in the mountains when Mars says, "Remember those, uh, those fire nymphs we used to kill when we were kids? Maybe you're one of those."

"I never killed any fire nymphs. You did that."

Mars laughs, and Axel winces. He can practically feel all that extra niceness evaporating around them. "That's right! And you cried, I forgot. I probably killed your mom or something. I'm sorry."

"I'm not a fire nymph. Don't be an asshole," Axel grumbles. He can feel hot nausea pooling in his belly, spreading out in prickly tendrils, and he wishes Mars would stop laughing. His laugh is so shrill and nasty and a totally uncomfortable contrast to his serene physical loveliness. Axel hates it.

"Oh, come on, Ax, you even look like one! It makes perfect sense." He starts ticking off on his fingers. "I mean, you're whiny, and ill-tempered, and you're ugly as sin, and you're so fucking annoying I sometimes fantasize about squishing you--"

Axel shoves Marluxia hard enough that he falls off the bed with a thump, and climbs over him, bending to gather up his clothes. Mars snatches wildly at his ankle and he stumbles-- catches himself on his palms-- kicks backward hard. Mars cries out and lets go, hands flying to his face, and Axel stands up, grabs his clothes, and stalks out into the hallway naked.

Halfway down the hall he stops, leaning against the wall to pull his shorts on, and Marluxia appears in the doorway of his bedroom, blood smeared over the lower half of his face, and he shouts raggedly, "Axel! We're DONE!"

"Good, you're a fucking creep," Axel calls back. Marluxia slams his door shut.

Axel sighs deeply. _Stupid. Stupid, stupid. That's what you get for trying to get personal with any of these assholes._

He walks slowly back to his own room, ignoring the sympathetic looks Demyx throws him as he passes.

 

***

 

And then, about eight months later, all of a sudden there's a new recruit.

It's all very strange. Usually they give Axel a few days' notice when he's going to be on training duty, and there's usually a lot of buzz about new blood in the Organization. But this time, Axel doesn't hear anything about it until he heads to the Gray Area for his assignments, like he does every morning, to find Saix waiting there with a new recruit, and the room otherwise empty.

"Axel, good of you to join us," Saïx says, in that condescendingly serene way he has. "This is Roxas, he'll be in your charge until he's suited for training."

"He's not ready for training yet?" Axel glances toward the kid, who's got that new-Nobody vacant-zombie-eyed-stare thing going on, and appears to have giant blue marbles where his eyes should be.

"How very astute. No, he's not ready for much of anything just yet, so he'll be with you."

 _Wrong. All wrong._ "This isn't how we do it with everybody else."

"This one's different," Saïx says, poking at the glass panel he carries around. "We need him. We don't need everybody else."

"We don't?"

"Don't play dumb. You know full well that we could function with only about three members. Well, four with Roxas here. But Master Xemnas has his plans for everyone, so."

He drops off, and Axel stares at the kid, feeling itchy and wrongfooted and wondering vaguely if he is one of the necessary  three. "What the fuck am I supposed to do with him?"

"I don't know, Axel, I don't really give a shit," Saïx says placidly, and he pulls up Axel's mission files. "You can start by bringing him along on your mission today. You're going to Hollow Bastion. There are a few high-ranking members of the Restoration Front you need to take care of."

He lifts the display and shows Axel his targets. Axel glances at them for about a second before saying, "You want me to bring this kid on a takeout mission? He barely looks like he can stand on his own."

This is all fucked up. New trainees don't go on elimination missions, and no one is ever, EVER permitted to go with Axel. Totally wrong.

"I told you, we need him, and he's safer with you than he is here. Besides, Master Xemnas assigned him to you. Do you want to take it up with him?"

Axel is terrified of Xemnas, and Saïx is perfectly aware of it. "No, that's okay."

"All right then. You have your orders." Saïx sweeps his left arm, and an Axel-sized swirling vortex of blue smoke opens next to them. "Bring him back in one piece, please."

"Okay," Axel says uneasily. His stomach is lurching and he wonders if he left it on the stairs coming in, if that were possible, but there is a job to be done, so he tugs on the kid's arm and says "Come on, Roxas," and steps into the dark corridor.

 

***

 

Axel is a quick thinker when he has to be, and in the 2.5(ish) seconds it takes to get from the castle to Hollow Bastion he has formulated a halfway decent little plan. His thought process goes like this:

Roxas is a new member which means he is potentially a New Friend. He is also Important which may mean he is Different, and if he is Different like Axel is Different, maybe Axel won't feel so much like the fucked-up anomaly monster that he is, maybe he won't be lonely anymore. And if anything happens to Roxas, not only will Axel not have a Potential New Friend anymore, but he'll fuck up his mission, and he'll get put in the Chamber, and over his dead body is that ever happening again. So Roxas can't be in danger, which means he needs to stay out of the way, and that works out for Axel, because (and he feels queasy considering this) he does not want his Potential New Friend Roxas's first Nobody memory to be of Axel brutally murdering a couple of guys who probably strictly speaking aren't really doing anything wrong.

They step out onto a sweeping  expanse of grass a short ways from the town surrounding Hollow Bastion, and Axel, still holding Roxas's wrist, pulls him a few yards to the edge of the woods bordering the field. He grabs Roxas's shoulders and plunks him down next to a tree, feeling hot, hotter than usual. It's too sunny and this is all weird and wrong but he thinks it might _(it might)_ be okay.

"Okay," he breathes, "you need to. . . stay here. Stay right here. And don't move."

Roxas blinks up at him with those giant blue tennis ball eyes.

"I mean, you can move, like, you can. . . breathe, and stuff, just don't. . . go anywhere. Do you understand?" The kid just stares at him, and Axel tries to remember if he was like that at the beginning. He can't, but he supposes that's telling in and of itself. "This shouldn't take long. I'll be back soon, okay?"

Axel turns, opens a portal next to Roxas's tree, and steps into it.

 

***

 

It doesn't take long to track down the first two, who are laughably, hilariously exposed, having lunch together in a noisy pub in the center of town, and Axel waits a while in the alley across the street for them to leave.

They take an obnoxiously long time, long enough for Axel to have three full internal discussions with himself about the pros and cons of going back to check on Roxas (who's probably just sitting in the dirt staring into space, but Axel doesn't do well with "probably"). He is starting in on a fourth when they come out, holding each other up and obviously inebriated. They debate for a few moments on which way to go, which involves a lot of hand-waving, and set out down the main street. Axel runs down his alley and up the street running parallel, and as they start to pass the next alley, Axel yanks them into it, kills one rather handily, and with his chakram to the other's throat, inquires very calmly as to the whereabouts of the third.

He cowers and twists and whines, which is annoying, and he sells out his leader, which is contemptible but useful, and Axel flirts momentarily with the idea of leaving him to bleed out but decides against it and slashes his throat instead.

His third target turns out to be near the castle. He opens a dark corridor and hefts the two bodies into it, and makes a brief stop at the sewer tunnels running below the city to dump the men before transporting to the edge of the vast canyon the ruins of the castle stand in. His target, a plump, balding man with an outrageous mustache, is setting up some sort of machine in the criminally hot sun, sweating and swearing.

He doesn't hear Axel come up behind him, and he doesn't make a sound when his throat is cut. Not that there'd be anyone around to hear it anyway.

Axel then regards the machine. It looks important, and if it's the reason Axel was required to kill this man it's probably better off destroyed. But Saïx didn't mention a machine, and he's got no idea what it's even for. In the end he settles for sticking his hand in it, yanking out the first thing he touches, and throwing it as far as he can away from the castle. He gets grease all over his gloves, which he solves by "accidentally" wiping them on Fat Target's pants as he heaves him up in a fireman's carry. Down in the sewers, he tosses Fat Target onto the small pile consisting of Dumb Target and Squicky Target, and sets the lot on fire.

All of this is done with no hesitation. Second nature. Muscle memory, like tying his shoes, or putting eyeliner on in the morning. He often doesn't actually consider what he's doing until he's done it, and the sickly smell of burning flesh hits him and makes his eyes water. He wonders if these men have families, and if they love them. Had families.

By the time he gets back to Roxas he is boiling inside his coat. The kid hasn't moved much; he's propped up against the same tree with his legs splayed out in front of him, and he is staring vacantly in the direction of a bird pecking at the ground a few feet away. "Hey," Axel calls, and Roxas raises his head. His eyes actually focus, which is certainly an improvement. Axel squats down next to him.

"Sorry I was gone so long. We've still got some time, though." He smiles. "What do you say we make a detour on the way back?"

 

***

 

It's better, somehow, this sitting here on top of the train station, having ice cream with a mute zombie. It fans the flames a little, makes the tragedies of today seem a little further away. Axel talks intermittently, even though he knows Roxas probably won't remember it, because he can't just not talk, and Roxas eats his ice cream silently.

It's almost, but not quite, like having a friend again. 

 

***

 

Later on that night, when most of the Organization is asleep, he goes looking for Saïx, who wasn't at dinner. He finds him in his office, going over the next day's missions, and stands silently at the door for a minute, uncertain about bugging him. Saïx doesn't like to be bugged, even by Axel.

But then Saïx frowns suddenly and says, "Axel, if you need something, quit lurking and make it quick."

"I'm not lurking, I'm standing," Axel says indignantly, automatically, and shakes his head. "I don't really need anything, I just, uh, wanted to ask about Roxas."

Saïx doesn't even turn away from his screen to look at Axel, just keeps frowning at it and clicking things. That hurts, a little bit. Like he can't be bothered. "Ask away."

"Why did you put him with me today?"

"I thought we went over this," Saïx says distractedly, and Axel feels a hot flush creep pricklingly over his skin. He resents Saïx for making him feel like a goddamn pest.

"Well yeah, we did, only you told me Master Xemnas assigned him to me, and now Xaldin is saying it was supposed to be him."

Saïx stiffens, almost imperceptibly, in his chair. "It was. I convinced the Master you were the better choice."

Axel takes a few steps forward, further into the room, and shakes his head. "Isa, not that I'm not flattered, but you wanna tell me what exactly you're doing here?"

"I don't take your meaning." He still won't fucking _look_ at Axel, and it's maddening.

"You don't just go against the Superior without a reason. So whatever it is you're planning, whatever you're not telling me, just say it. I'll go along with it, I don't care. Just _tell_ me."

There is a long pause, long enough that Axel starts to think about leaving, and that it was pointless to come down here expecting anything out of Saïx. Saïx is a brick wall these days, a high, unbreachable brick wall specially designed to keep Organization secrets in and Axel out.

Then Saïx swivels in his chair, sighing, and raises his eyes to Axel's. "He is Sora's Other," he says carefully.

Sora. It's a familiar name, but it takes Axel a moment to place it. "The Keyblade kid?"

Saïx nods. "He is. . . essential to our goal."

"Wait," Axel murmurs. "Is he that kid? The one we met a long time ago, in the courtyard?"

"No," Saïx says, a little too sharply, and Axel narrows his eyes and files that away for later. "Axel, I no longer believe the Master is acting in the Organization's best interests."

It takes Axel a minute to process this, staring into Saïx's unimpeachably calm face. Actual information? Secrets? _And about Lord Xemnas, no less._ "What? He's not-- what do you mean? What is he doing?"

"That, I can't tell you."

"Can't or won't?" Axel quips.

"Honestly? Both." Saïx turns back to his computer, and Axel wants to hurl his chakrams through the monitor. _You can't just let loose something like that and not follow up, you dick._ "But I thought it wise to keep Roxas close for the time being, until he develops his own compass. He's a very powerful, very valuable, weapon, and we can't afford to take any chances."

"Uh-huh, yeah, I got that." Axel leans against the doorframe and wills the back of Saïx's head to tell him more. He's curious as hell. _What is Xemnas doing?_

_And why the fuck aren't you telling me?_

Saïx sighs, and brings his hands to his face, and Axel can see he's rubbing his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose with his middle fingers, like he used to do when he was exhausted or annoyed. "That's all you're getting out of me tonight."

Axel pushes off the wall and says lightly, "Fair enough. Goodnight, Isa."

"Axel."

"Yeah."

"I may need you to do me a few favors, in the very near future."

He looks back over his shoulder. Saïx hasn't moved. "What kind of favors?"

"And I'll need you not to ask questions."

Incensed, Axel leaves Saïx to the softly glowing computer monitor, snapping the door shut behind him harder than is strictly necessary.


	2. First Things First

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Axel allows himself a very small amount of tentative hope over the next few days.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, fully almost a year later. . . here is chapter 2. BUT! This means the end of the stuff I've been workshopping for like 3-4 years! I've had a better track record with my more recent stuff. And I've got plans. Big plans. I promise not to leave this that long again.
> 
> Many many many thanks to [thugboyfriendnagisa](http://archiveofourown.org/users/thugboyfriendnagisa/pseuds/thugboyfriendnagisa) for betaing at my EXTREMELY URGENT REQUEST, you are the best.

Axel allows himself a very small amount of tentative hope over the next few days.

It's tough. He's forced himself to be a pessimist for a long time, and he's trying hard to remind himself that Roxas might not be Different, might not even like Axel if he is. But there are so many surprises, so many good signs, that he HAS to hope, just a tiny little bit. And the kid is just so damn interesting.

Roxas is progressing fast, faster than any other new members Axel's had to train, and within just two days he's starting to show signs of a personality. He likes nature; when Axel has to take him along on missions, he watches birds and lizards, or flops on his back in the grass and stares at the clouds for hours. On his fourth day, Axel comes back (wiping blood from his gloves, his brain buzzing and dull red pain pounding behind his eyes) to find Roxas in a tree about thirty feet off the ground, looking thoroughly confused about how he got there.

On his fifth day, he joins Axel in the common room for Luxord's weekly poker game, between Axel and Xigbar. He doesn't play, but leans into Axel and watches the passing of the cards with interest, his blond brows knitted together. Xigbar levels some stupid comment at Axel, doesn't Axel feel his "talents are being under-utilized" being "forced" to "play nanny for the kid", and he claps his hand on Roxas's shoulder. Roxas seizes his arm, yanks him up out of his seat and slams him on his back on the table. It collapses in half under him. Axel is delighted.

On the morning of Roxas's seventh day, Axel is interrupted in his morning routine by a sudden harsh knock at his bedroom door. He sighs, looking at his half-finished kohl job in the mirror, and opens it reluctantly.

Saïx is standing there with the kid, his hands firmly on Roxas's shoulders. Roxas's eyes are misty and unfocused again, and he's actually swaying a little bit. Alarmed, Axel leans down and tugs him forward before Saïx can even speak.

"What did you do to him?" he snaps, cupping his hand on Roxas's chin, tipping his head back to gauge his pupil response. _Goddamnit, he was doing so well_. 

Saïx puts his hands up and says, a touch defensively, "I didn't do anything."

Axel turns Roxas's face to the right with a finger up in front of it, trying to get his eyes to follow it. When he starts to turn him to the left, his vision snags on something and his stomach drops.

He pushes Roxas's hair up to examine the shaved stripe on his head and there, curving over his ear, from his temple around almost to the back of his head, is a long, ugly row of stitches. He breathes out a shaky exhale through his nose. "What the fuck is this?"

"I don't _know_ , Axel. I found him like this and I brought him to you."

He runs his finger gently over the gash, feeling sick. His shoulders, just above his armpits, ache suddenly, sharply. _I bet you found him outside Vexen's room, didn't you._

Yeah. This has Vexen's stink all over it.

There's a flinch and a small noise pushing out of Roxas's mouth, and Axel pulls his hand back. Roxas's eyes are clearing a little bit, lids and lashes twitching. Axel smiles a little in spite of himself ( _resilient, that's good_ ) then almost immediately sours again when he zeroes in on the brush of purpling bruise just over his eyebrow. Broad and flat. Like he's been hit.

_Here's a question, Ax-- why is that worse?_

"Axel."

"What?" He straightens again, eyes level with Saïx. "You can leave now."

Saïx's mouth twists downward momentarily and he sighs and he says, "There's a meeting in ten minutes. Get him--" a smooth flick of his eyes over Roxas's face "--presentable."

Axel stares at him a few beats longer, eyes narrowed, trying to detect anything at all in his impossibly mild face other than a vague sense of annoyance. Then he clears his throat. "Fine."

Saïx sweeps away and Axel is left to usher Roxas into his room. He sits the kid down at the edge of his bed and chews at his lip. Roxas looks up at him expectantly.

"Presentable. Okay." Long exhale. "Well, we've gotta do something about that."

A few minutes and an awkward, sleepy conversation later, Axel is returning to the bedroom with Demyx's clippers ("okay, but please, just. . . don't junk 'em up with your stupid mane, all right?") and a comb. He squats down in front of Roxas, takes a long look with his tongue between his teeth, and starts parting longer pieces over.

He talks to himself vaguely while he cuts Roxas's hair, and almost doesn't hear him speak over the buzz of the clippers. It's a soft, unfamiliar sound that takes him a second to register.

"What's that?" he says, finishing up, craning his neck to glance at Roxas's face. His eyebrows are furrowed.

"Access."

Axel leans back over to wipe fallen hair from the hood of Roxas's coat. "Access?" He inspects his work, runs his ungloved fingers through the newly shaved parts to make sure they're even, swooshes all the uncut hair from his crown forward and over. It's a good job. Hides the stitches, and it's cute. Stylish, even. Demyx'll definitely be jealous; thinks he's the only one allowed to be counterculture around here. "Access, that's a weird first word, but I guess there's worse-- _oh_."

His face cracks into a wide smile, and he scoots over on the floor, circling his long arms around his knees. "Ax- _el_."

Roxas's nose and eyebrows crinkle up, a crease going through the bruise. "Ax- _ull_ ," he says. Slowly, rolling the sound around his mouth like he's trying it out, trying to see if it fits him. It feels like blessedly warm sunshine cutting right through Axel's chest.

"You got it." He reaches up  and pushes aside Roxas's bangs, inspects the size of his bruise. Touches it gently. "I can probably cover that," he mutters, and rises to go find his makeup case.

 

***

 

Axel helps Roxas up into his seat and steadies him just as the Master himself is sweeping into the Round Room, intimidating and disdainful as always. He gives Axel a slight obligatory nod, and Axel returns it, averting his eyes and murmuring, "Lord Xemnas," into the top of Roxas's head.

"That's a good look on him, Axel, is that your handiwork?" Luxord inquires warmly, settling into his chair next to Marluxia, who snorts and rolls his eyes. _Bitter exes,_ Axel thinks as he answers Luxord enthusiastically over Mars's head, _is there anything less attractive?_

Axel is hopping up into his own designated chair between Saïx and Demyx when Vexen enters, and he promptly kicks the raising lever on the side to avoid having to address him or even look at him.

"What in the hell," Demyx says loudly next to him, fixated on Vexen, and Axel reluctantly glances down and receives a shock. Vexen isn't alone; he's firmly clamped onto the arm of what looks to be another new recruit.

 _And here's something interesting,_ Axel ponders, curving forward and squinting down at the newbie with sharp, narrow consideration-- he looks to be about the same size as Roxas. It's tough to tell with his hood up, but they've got the same stocky build, the same splay shoulders. Just after Roxas showed up with a hole in his head, too.

What are the chances.

 

***

 

The last few days have been weird all over, Axel thinks to himself as he takes another bite of his ice cream, nose filled with the stink of blood baking into his clothes. He's still not sure how he feels about it.The meeting, held only for the purpose of inducting a new member, was brief. The kid refused to speak at all or even lower his hood, which struck Axel as both suspicious and downright creepy. Lord Xemnas introduced him as "Xion, our fourteenth brother", tossed in a few afterthoughts about "excellence", and disappeared. As they all clambered down from their seats, Larxene, pissy and shrill as always, had balked.

"We've _always_ been thirteen," she snapped to no one in particular. "We're _Organization XIII_. We've already got Roxas, why are we making exceptions now?"

And Xigbar, still lounging in his lowering chair, drawled, "Oh _sorry_ , Larxene, I forgot the Master was supposed to run all the Organization's decisions by you personally," and Larxene asked him if he could enunciate more because it was difficult to understand him with Xemnas's dick in his mouth, and suddenly Xigbar was on the floor with one of his six-guns pointed straight at Larxene's head and she just laughed and laughed. On any other day Axel would've stuck around to fan the flames and watch them knock each other around, but today all he wanted was to get out of the Round Room, and away from the silent staring new recruit, and away from Vexen, who was looking at Roxas like he wanted to flay him open and put him under a microscope.

Saïx caught him on the way out, physically _caught_ him by a fistful of his coat. "You're training Roxas today."

Axel looked down at Roxas, frowning. "You think he's ready?"

"I think there's no time like the present for him to start learning some self-defense," Saïx said lightly, with a pointed glance in Vexen's direction, and Axel took his meaning just fine.

So Axel took Roxas to Twilight Town (where, he was pleased to see, it was a gorgeous cloudless day and no kids were hanging around because everyone with an ounce of sensibility had already left for the beach) and got him set up in the struggle court.

"All right, Roxas," he said, stripping off his coat and tossing it over one the spectator benches, "what we're gonna be doing today is just some simple combat basics."

Roxas blinked up at him. "Combat?"

"Fighting. Defending yourself. Can you summon your weapon?"

Roxas looked down at his gloved hands and asked, "Do I have a weapon?"

 _Glory be,_  thought Axel, _a whole sentence_. "Kid, you have _the_ weapon. It's okay, it's easy. Just close your eyes and kind of. . . will it to you."

Roxas did, and a giant key flickered into his right hand.

Axel didn't envy Roxas, having to fight with that thing-- it certainly looked awkward and unwieldy to swing-- but he did have to appreciate the beauty of it, with its brass handle and long, slim silver barrel. He did a lot of reading about the Keyblade Wars when he was younger, and he'd seen all the paintings and sculptures of the Keyblade Masters on field trips and library outings, but he'd only ever seen one in person once before, when he was a kid. They were all supposed to be dead now.

(That night, after Saïx had soundly shut him down, Axel had stormed back to his room, gone to his closet, and upturned all the old boxes of journals he wasn't supposed to have, hunting through them for something, _anything_ , about Roxas. He hadn't gotten a lick of sleep, thanks to his younger self's haphazard form of bookkeeping, and the only reward he'd gotten for his efforts was a single page in a notebook he thought he might have kept around the time, with the word "Ventus" scrawled in his own loopy, feminine script, surrounded by (Axel was slightly embarrassed to see) ivy and hearts.)

Roxas looked at home enough holding it, and that went a lot further toward confirming his suspicions.

But. First things first.

"It gets easier, once you get more in touch with your weapon. Soon it'll become a part of you, and you won't even have to think about calling it." Axel snapped his hand out and caught one of his chakrams out of thin air, noting (with no small amount of glee) the amazement on Roxas's face. "Everyone has a different weapon. I use chakrams. Yours, incidentally, is called a Keyblade, and as I said, it is THE weapon. Very big. Very important."

Roxas hefted it a little, examining the chain on it, and asked, "Why's it so important?"

"Well, we'll get to that. First things first," Axel said out loud, scanning the court. Sure enough, there were inky black creepy crawlies rising out of the ground, antennae twitching, sniffing the air hopefully.

Maybe there were just some things the body never really forgot, Axel thought, watching Roxas spar. He leapt and leaned with the Keyblade, more an extension of the weapon than its master. He only needed to be saved once. Axel was outwardly pleased--  Roxas's apparent prowess meant a little less work on his part-- but there was no doubt in his mind. Sora's Other or not, Roxas had to be the same kid he'd met all those years ago.

_But why now? Why here, with no heart?_

The next day was better. Roxas showed up at his bedroom door again, on his own this time and practically bouncing on the balls of his feet. Axel took him back to Twilight Town and, after setting up the perimeter around the Sandlot again, set him loose.

"That was easy," Roxas said brightly after an hour, jogging back over to where Axel sat punching buttons on the glass panel he'd swiped from Saïx's office ( _Denied. Denied. Classified_. Then a bright red alert, flashing in the middle of the screen: _BRING IT BACK, AXEL_.) He was panting and there was dirt on his face, but his grin could power their whole dark city. "What else you got?"

Axel felt a smile creep across his face like an infection. "I don't make them _myself_ , y'know."

"I know. Come on, I wanna fight something bigger."

He came more alive the more he handled the Keyblade, Axel noticed. It was like he knew it too, in the possessive, hungry way he gripped the thing. Like he was _pulling_ energy out of it.

Nothing too strenuous, Saïx had said. But he couldn't say no to that face. "All right," he said, rising to his feet, "let's go see what we can find in the forest."

The next day Axel got an elimination, and Marluxia got Roxas.

"Gotta cut the cord sometime, Ax," Mars said, a pretty smirk curving the corners of his stupid perfect mouth. Roxas waved sadly before following him into the dark corridor.

"I thought you wanted him to learn how to fight," Axel said bitterly. "All he's gonna learn from that idiot is how not to get blood on his shoes."

Saïx made a _hmph_ noise and brought up his mission notes on the screen. "Speaking of, the communal laundry _is_ communal, Axel. The others would like to use it once in a while."

"When they get _their_ coats dirty--" Axel tugged one glove on, and then the other "--they're welcome to it."

"That includes me."

"Like I said."

The day after that, Roxas was gone with Vexen before Axel even woke up.

"What the _fuck_ , Isa?!"

Saïx didn't flinch, didn't even bat an eye. "He needs to learn effective research techniques."

"He's gonna bring him back in pieces," Axel snarled, "in carefully marked boxes."

"Roxas is perfectly safe."

"You can't know that."

"He is _being_ ," Saïx said, raising his voice enough to be firm and deliberate, that no-nonsense tone whose first and foremost purpose was to make Axel shut the hell up and listen, " _monitored_."

And he gave Axel a brief knowing look, before his eyes swept back down to his tablet.

"You're going soft," Axel heard him say as he opened his corridor. It burrowed down through his ears into his skull and smarted in exactly the way it was meant to.

"Watch me," he said, stepping in.

Today Roxas is with Larxene, and they hadn't been back yet when Axel went to give Saïx the documents he'd been sent out for. Which is just as well, really, as Axel is in a foul mood that even ice cream doesn't seem to be fixing. Things had gotten _slightly_ out of hand, and he'd ended up having to kill two witnesses.

He doesn't like making messes. He _detests_ having to clean them up.

He licks the last of the melting ice cream from the stick, tosses it into the neat little pile he adds to every day, and goes back for a shower.

 

***

 

The shower doesn't help either. The water is too hot and his towels get damp, and everything is sweaty. He gets out feeling even scummier than he did when he got in.

Once he's gotten all his clothes into a basket, and had time to lie on his bed and indulge in some useless self-pity, he throws on a t-shirt and some sweats) and takes the lot down to the laundry. It's not till he's on his way back with an impulsively bought Moogle sucker in his mouth that he realizes there are noises coming from Roxas's room.

He pokes his head in. "Hey, Rox-- whoa, what happened?"

For half a second before Roxas yanks the whole thing off and throws it into the corner, Axel sees one of the sleeves of his coat is ripped neatly open, and the arm beneath it bloody. He's also sporting a magnificent shiner, cheek swelling up purple around a painful-looking split.

Peeking up over the stretched-out neck of the white undershirt he wears, just under the hollow of his throat, is an inch or so of pale, knotted scar tissue.

Axel tries not to stare at the same time part of him breaks loose and starts gleefully screaming _SCAR, SCAR, he's got a SCAR_ \-- and he tries not to wonder how old it is, how far it goes, what it's from, because Roxas is talking and he's agitated. "What?"

"I said I got my _ass_ handed to me," Roxas says ruefully, snatching a green bottle from his bureau and popping the seal. As he drinks, the gash on his arm starts to knit itself together.

"Oh." Axel leans his hip against the doorframe. "Well, don't be too hard on yourself. Those big ones can be a real bitch starting out."

Roxas finishes the Potion with a hard gulp. "It wasn't the big ones," he says. He chucks the plastic bottle into the corner, where it lands in his metal wastebasket with a small crash. "It was the little ones."

 

***

 

He tracks her down after dinner. Not that she's hard to find, laid out on the squashy sofa in the rec room with her head in Demyx's lap.

Larxene doesn't look up when he comes in, just licks her middle finger and turns the page of her magazine. "Come for pointers, Axel? I heard you got sloppy today."

"I got a bone to pick with you," he says, ignoring the dig. It's deserved, frankly.

"'Fraid I'm engaged at the moment," she says lazily. "So sorry. Feel free to come back later--"

"Demyx, get out."

"No, Demyx, you stay right where you are," Larxene says loudly, and Demyx shrinks back against the cushions, looking thoroughly like he'd like to melt into them. "Axel likes to have an audience for his tantrums."

Axel's fists clench. _Fine_. "Fine." _Better he see this, too._ "If you ever pull something like that again-- _ever_ \-- I will personally throw you in the Chamber myself."

"Oh _will_ you." She turns another page.

"Roxas could have been killed."

"Anyone could be killed at any time, Axel, that's what makes living so fun."

"You think this shit is cute?" he demands. He can actually feel himself losing his cool, like he's an outline filling up with red. "You think it's funny?"

She grins up at him, showing sharp teeth. "A little."

"Tell you what." He lifts one rock-steady hand and points it toward the door. "Why don't I just head down the hall to the Master's room--" her eyes flash at the mention of Lord Xemnas "--and we'll just see how funny he thinks it is that you took his most valuable recruit's weapon from him and shoved him into a fight. He's got a great sense of humor, I bet he'll think that's a _scream_ \--"

"Tell _you_ what, Axel--" She whips up out of Demyx's lap and is suddenly on her knees gripping the arm of the sofa, looking up into his face from less than a foot away. "Why don’t you give me a curriculum next time, and I'll follow it to the letter, because lord knows we wouldn't want him to be good at more than _one fucking thing_."

Axel grits his teeth, pushing out his chin. "Listen--"

"No, _you_ listen," Larxene hisses. "I _detest_ babysitting. I _resent_ being made to waste _my_ valuable time and talents on _useless_ _tadpoles_ who are only going to _replace_ me. But I do it, and I do it well. You know why? Because unlike _you_ , I take pride in a job well done. Now. . . " Her eyes flick up to his hair. "I'm told you have a brain under that mop. Maybe you could _use_ it for one fucking second, and _think_ about Roxas's weapon."

"I don't see what--"

"He has a _Keyblade_." She jabs a flat row of fingers into Axel's chest. "And right now, he's the only one. Which means everybody out there is going to try to _take it_ from him. He _needs to learn_ how to _defend himself without it_. Do _you_ want to see him get eviscerated the first time someone _actually dangerous_ decides to come after him?"

Axel's face is burning. All of a sudden he feels very stupid. "I didn't-- I didn't think about that."

"No, you didn't. You know why? Because _you_ \-- and _you_ , Demyx, you can listen up too-- have a loyal weapon that's been assigned to _you personally_. It only answers to _you_. It only _works_ for you. Some of us aren't so lucky. Some of us have to rely on something _else_ when our weapons get stolen from us. Like _magic_." Larxene sits back on her heels. "You can do whatever the  _hell_ you want with your trainees when _you've_ got them. Send them out naked for all I care. But when _I've_ got them, they're goddamn well going to learn something. That okay by you?"

Axel can't think of anything else to do; he just nods. Larxene nods back definitively, settles back against a shell-shocked--looking Demyx, and picks up her magazine again.

After a moment she glances back up at Axel. "Did you want something else?"

He shakes his head. "No."

"All right, then. . . " She makes a shooing motion at him. He wonders how many times she's had to fight without her weapon. He thinks about his chakrams, about how easily they snap into his hands and how they feel more like extra limbs than something made, and he wonders if he'd be capable of doing the same. A lump rises in his throat.

She sighs loudly, rearing her head back. "Okay, dude, _what_?"

"Nothing," he says. "Really. Just. . . Look, I'm sorry. For not. . . appreciating. What you do."

She raises one thin yellow eyebrow. "It’s fine."

Axel nods again, quickly, and turns to leave.

"Oh, and-- Axel?"

He glances back over his shoulder.

"Don't ever tell me how to do my job."


	3. Melting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lord, but he doesn't want to do this next part. He doesn't really _have_ to, but he figures it's better than the alternative.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pretty short chapter this time, sorry. I thought I was going to combine this and the next one, but it didn't really sit right. Hope you enjoy! Feedback is always appreciated.
> 
> /Update 10.31.16: So as much as I love this fic, and as much time and love as I've put into it. . . I don't know that I'm going to continue it. I think it's just too big for me right now. I'm sorry. I may update it sometime in the future, but for right now I'm calling it done. (I should be posting a different Akuroku fic shortly though, also set in [my version of] the canon timeline.)

It's another gorgeous, cloudless day in Twilight Town, just barely bordering on muggy. Axel goes to get the ice cream while he waits for Roxas even though it's not his turn, because he feels prickly after the conversation with Saïx and he needs to do _something_ , but when he finally gets to the front of the line, they're all out of sea salt. 

"You've got to be kidding me." 

The creamery lady shakes her head apologetically. "Sorry, dear. I just sold the last two. I do sell _other_ things though, you know. A little variety might be good for you." 

For half a second Axel considers running down the two kids that had been in front of him, but instead he reluctantly buys two ice cream sodas—one cherry, one chocolate—and returns to the train station, knowing that Roxas is going to be disappointed. 

Roxas is already up on the roof, stripping off his coat. For a second he looks like a painting, all golden curves silhouetted against the setting sun—but then he turns and sees Axel, and sighs. "Damn, I thought I actually beat you for once. What's that?" 

"They were out of sea salt," Axel says, and holds out the two cups. "I didn't know which kind you'd like, so I got both." 

"They were _out_?" Roxas says incredulously even as he picks up a spoon to try one. He's got another black eye, and his eyebrow is split. 

"Yeah, little assholes in front of me got the last two." 

"I didn't even know they _could_ run out. My entire worldview is shattered." Roxas licks his lips and taps the rim of the chocolate soda. "That one." 

Axel hands it to him and sits down at the edge of the roof with his soda. It's just as well Roxas took the chocolate. Chocolate always makes his mouth feel heavy. "What happened to you?" 

"You know those, uh, fire flowers?" Roxas settles down next to him. "Turns out the big ones have these big walloping vines. Yeah. You like it? I was thinkin' about keeping it." 

Axel chuckles. 

"Seriously, I get 'em so often it's not even worth the waste of a potion anymore." Roxas spoons ice cream into his mouth and asks thickly, "What about you? How'd your mission go?" 

Axel sucks on his straw. He has to think for a minute before he remembers which one was today. "It was all right, I guess," he says.   

The last couple weeks have been largely routine and uneventful. Wake up. Shower, get dressed, makeup. Get mission from Saïx. Find, tail, quick cut, sewers (or forest, or cave), burn. Back to the castle for laundry and another shower if things got messy. He's back up to his old standards, and he might be less okay with it, if not for the addition of Roxas to his daily post-mission ice cream trips.  

Which is why he's kind of dreading this next part. 

"Huh. Well, mine was pretty good," Roxas says. "My Keyblade changed again, though. That makes. . . four times now, I think. Do you think that's weird?" 

Axel makes a noncommittal noise. 

"Yeah, Larxene said they do that sometimes, but not usually that fast." Roxas kicks his heels against the outside wall of the train station. "I hope it's not bad. Like. . . it can't decide if it likes me. Or I'm just so bad at using it that it keeps changing to try and make me better." 

Lord, but he doesn't want to do this next part. He doesn't really _have_ to, he supposes—and Saïx had been pretty clear that he'd rather Axel didn't—but he figures it's better than the alternative. Better than Roxas finding out for himself when he goes down for breakfast tomorrow and Axel isn't there. Better than Axel just disappearing and never coming back if, Kingdom Hearts forbid, he got himself killed.  

"Hey." Roxas bumps his shoulder into Axel's. "You alright? You're being uncharacteristically quiet." 

Axel frowns down at his melting soda. _Be careful_ , he hears Saïx say in that part of Axel's brain he permanently occupies. _We don't want him running after you. Or worse, after_ him _._   

 _Speak for yourself,_ he fires back. He does want Roxas running after him. Fucking everywhere if he wants to. 

"Listen, Rox," he starts carefully, not looking at him, "I'm gonna be. . . going away for a while." 

Roxas stops searching for lumps of still-frozen ice cream with his spoon and looks up. "What? Why?" 

"Mission," Axel says. "Big one." 

"How big?" 

 _Discretion_ , Saïx reminds him firmly. "We're setting up a new research facility—" he can almost _feel_ the lie burning a hole through his tongue "—in mostly uncharted territory. It's not just me, either, half the Organization's going." 

"How long is 'a while'?" 

"I don't know. As long as it takes. Hopefully only a couple of weeks." 

" _W_ _eeks_ _?_ Plural?" 

"Yeah." 

Roxas pulls a face and looks back down. Below them, some kids have started up a struggle match. "When are you leaving?" 

"Tomorrow. Early." 

" _Tom—_ when were  you gonna tell me?!" 

"I only found out like an hour ago! You know they don't tell us anything—" 

"Right," Roxas interrupts. "Fine. Great. So you're going off to do something new and exciting, and I'm stuck here being the Organization's chore boy." 

Axel snorts. "New and exciting? I'll be stuck in the middle of nowhere with a bunch of assholes I hate, building another fucking castle." 

"It'd at least be a change of scenery," Roxas grumbles, forcefully muddling his soda with his spoon. 

"Rox, do I _look_ like I was built for manual labor? Trust me, I'd rather stay behind." That part, at least, is true. He'd rather not do any of it. Well. . . call it 80%. One part he's actually pretty damn excited about. "Wait a sec. Are you mad I'm gonna be gone, or just mad you don’t get to go?" 

"Oh, quit fishing," Roxas snaps. Axel feels his ears go red. 

 _I'll tell you,_ he promises silently. _Soon. Right when I get back, even. Those dreams you've been having, that kid, those people that keep popping into your thoughts. Why your Keyblade knows what you're thinking before you even do. Whatever you want to know. I'll tell you everything I know, and everything I find out. After this part's done._  

His ice cream is melting rapidly in his hands, bubbling around the edges.  

Roxas takes a drink from his soda cup, licks chocolate from the corners of his mouth, and says, "Okay. So you're gonna be gone for a—for a while, and that's. . . fine." 

"It's fine?" 

"Yeah." 

"It doesn't _sound_ fine." 

"I can deal with it." Roxas sighs. "Just. . . Let me know when you're leaving, okay? Or I'll, I don't know. Hunt you down and beat you up." 

"You'll be asleep," Axel says, choosing not to point out that they'd both come off looking worse for the wear in that match. 

"So wake me up." Roxas knocks his cup against Axel's. "All right?" 

A yell wafts up to them, carried by an errant breeze. One of the kids in the plaza is crying foul and the others have stopped the game to argue. "Yeah," Axel says. "All right." 

"Good," Roxas says, seeming satisfied. He lets out a deep exhale and glances over. "Dude, what happened to your ice cream?" 

 

***

 

"Roxas." Axel taps his knuckles lightly on the door. "Roxas, hey." He pushes it open. 

Roxas is asleep, curled into the fetal position under what must be five or six standard-issue black Organization blankets, layered on top of him and tucked tight under his feet. A wide stripe of moonlight, the constant reminder of their goal, falls across his bed.  

Axel approaches him carefully and kneels down. "Roxas," he whispers, shaking his shoulder gently. "Hey." 

Roxas mumbles fuzzily, eyebrows pulling down.  

"Come on, Rox, you told me to wake you up." 

He cracks one eye open and squints up at Axel. "What?" 

"I gotta leave soon." 

"Mm." Roxas closes his eyes again. "You have to?" 

"Yeah." 

"You're coming back, right?" 

"Course I am." 

One hand edges out from under the covers and tugs Axel's hand down from his shoulder. He presses his mouth to Axel's palm. Axel is very still. 

"Now you have to come back," Roxas murmurs, and lets go. He's asleep again before Axel even leaves the room. 


End file.
